Ohio Election Games

The primaries are currently scheduled in Ohio for March 6 (Super Tuesday). However, the recent appeal from a petition group that wants to put the 2012 Congressional Districts on the Nov. 2012 ballot has thrown a wrench into things. Since there is a possibility that no one will know what the districts look like for the 2013 Congress, the Ohio legislature is looking to buy itself more time in trying to figure out what to do.

To accomplish this, the Ohio Senate passed a bill yesterday that keeps nearly all the primaries in March. But it moves the Congressional and Presidential primaries to June 12. Why the Presidential primaries? Because of the way Ohio allocates delegates to the Republican Party convention, which rely on Congressional District vote totals to apportion the delegates from each district.

This bill still has to pass the House and then be signed by the Governor. However, with the likelihood of the Congressional Districts being unresolved in the next few weeks, postponement is a very likely possibility. For the Democrats this is no big deal as there is only one person on their ballot. But for the Republicans, this is rather annoying as it is highly likely that the contest will be decided by June. In March there would have still been some uncertainty as the race will probably have started to reduce itself to a Romney vs. not-Romney contest (with Mr. Cain and Mr. Perry being the strongest vyers for this role at the moment). But, such is life.

Once the dust is settled here and between New Hampshire and Nevada (Iowa has now locked fully in to Jan. 3 as their caucus date), I'll repost the dates so we can get a bead on when we can start to figure who will be challenging Mr. Obama next year.

One final note, it is looking as though Nevada may back down and reschedule their caucus for Tuesday Jan. 17. That would give enough space between contests that New Hampshire would then insert itself into the Jan. 10 spot. This has not been officially confirmed yet though.